


Twisted sisters

by zmeischa



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Fandom Kombat 2013, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-05
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2018-02-07 13:17:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1900332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zmeischa/pseuds/zmeischa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four maidens from the Twins and their family values.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fair Walda

Walda Frey hated her name. Her parents had called her Walda to please great-grandfather Walder, but for the last thirty years many other sons, daughters, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Lord Frey had had the same bright idea, and the Twins were swarming with Walders and Waldas. Great-grandfather wasn’t exactly pleased with that.

While they were young, they were called by their parents’ names: Walton’s Walda, Raegar’s Walda, Merreth’s Walda, – but it was still too long, there were too many boys and girls in the Twins, and Walda knew that sooner or later she’d get a nickname that would stick.

“Blond Walda,” she would mutter, looking into a polished mirror. “Walda Goldilocks. Blue-eyed Walda.”

Her eyes, in all fairness, were rather grey, but the ballads rarely sang about grey-eyed maidens, and Walda simply adored the ballads. She could spend hours sitting at some passerby bard’s feet, listening to him and dreaming about a handsome knight who one day would mark her out in the crowd of aunts, nieces and cousins, put her on his white steed and take her far away from her parents, Great-grandfather Walder and the Twins.

Walda had known all her life that someday she would marry a lord. When great-grandfather married Lady Annara, Walda asked her mother whether she herself could marry great-grandfather after that lady died. Mother slapped her and called a shameless girl, and Walda realized that great-grandfather, his riches and his castle were not meant for her. To her knowledge, Ser Edmure, the son of Lord Hoster Tully, was the best lord ever, and Walda decided that someday she’d marry him. Great-grandfather, though, proposed Tyta for Ser Edmure, Tyta the old maid, and Walda spent the whole day crying and decided that she hated Tyta and wished her a grim death. However, Lord Tully politely declined Tyta. Rumours had it that he meant Ser Edmure for a Dornish princess, and Walda’s hate and wishes of grim death were redirected to Dorne.

The other girls and she would get into the pantry from time to time, gorge themselves with nuts and dates and boast about their beauty. Walda would let her hair down and show that she was that close to sitting on it. The girls would sigh with envy: they all knew that fair ladies from the ballads were able to sit on their tresses, and, as bad luck would have it, most Frey girls had thin mousy hair that barely reached shoulder-blades. Roslin would say that she would be the greatest beauty after she grew up, because her mother had been from the house of Rosby, and all Rosby women were famous for their beauty. Amerei would say that her waist was the narrowest, and when they measured each other with string, Walda’s waist did prove to be the whole inch wider. And that was when Merreth’s Walda, sweet juice of dates bubbling on her lips, said importantly,

“I’m the fairest of you all.”

The girls rocked with laughter. Merreth’s Walda resembled an apple fritter, round and dripping with fat. Not a bit disconcerted, she assumed a dignified air, turned sideways to them and pointed to the front of her dress.

“I’m the fairest because I have breasts and you don’t.”

It was true. Of course, Amerei’s chest did have two insignificant bulges, but all the Twins knew she was putting cloth there. Walda’s mother would say indignantly that only whores did that, and that Amerei would end up in a brothel. Walda’s own dress fit so close that anyone could see she was a decent girl. Roslin didn’t count at all, of course.

“That’s just fat,” Walda said with disdain. “You’re not fair, you’re fat.”

Merreth’s Walda put her hands on her wide hips.

“And you… and you… and you’re flat!”

“Flat Walda!” Amerei exclaimed gleefully. She and Merreth’s Walda were sisters, and while there was no love lost between them – no one in the Twins loved his siblings – they always sided with each other. “Flat Walda, Flat Walda!”

Walda was not to be ousted.

“Fat Walda! Fat, Fat, Fat!”

From that day on the terrible nickname Flat Walda stuck to her. The fact that Merreth’s Walda was now called Fat Walda was no consolation. All grown-ups thought it a great joke, they would make both girls sit together at dinner, send them on errands together and use any occasion to call to them: “Hey, Fat Walda and Flat Walda!” Fat Walda would just stick out her tongue and go, “Baaa!”, but Walda would turn pale with hatred and wish them all a grim death.

The worst thing was – she wasn’t flat anymore. Soon after the pantry discordance she flowered, grew several inches taller (which had delayed her sitting on her hair) and one day when she was trying on her new dress Mother said in a worried voice,

“It seems to be too tight in front, I’ll have to add some cloth. The money you cost, you will be the ruin of us all someday!”

Walda would spend hours looking at the mirror and muttering angrily,

“I’m not flat! I’m not!”

Still, she remained Flat Walda till the day Lord Hoster Tully came to the Twins. He looked at Walders and Waldas, the identical chinless sharp-nosed faces, saw the blond pretty girl and, glad of a chance to praise something in Lord Frey’s household, asked,

“And who is this maiden fair?”

“My great-granddaughter Walda,” great-grandfather grumbled. “They are all called Walders and Waldas, my dear children hope I’ll grow soft and leave all my money to one of these brats. Well, let them hope, let them hope. You, Fair Walda, pour some wine for our guest.”

From that day on no one would call Fair Walda flat. Her mother gave her two new dresses, (one of them even had real lace), her father gave her a thin gold chain and a polished hand-mirror, and Walda would spend her days looking at herself.

“I’m fair,” she would say, turning her head to show her long graceful neck. “I’m the fairest of them all.”

“One of these days this girl will look at the mirror one time too many, fall and break her fair nose,” the great-grandfather would grumble. “Someone should find a husband for her before she ruins me, or falls sick with grayscale, or turns out to be a whore like Amerei.”

One day Aunt Genna came to the Twins. She pinched Fair Walda’s cheek, called her a pretty girl ( _I’m not pretty, I’m fair_ , Walda thought) and locked herself with great-grandfather to discuss some grave secret. All the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Lord Frey glued their ears to the closed doors.

Fat Walda met Fair Walda in the passage and sing-songed,

“There is something that I kno-o-o-ow…”

Fair Walda shrugged her shoulders in a dignified manner.

“What dishes they’ll serve for dinner, I guess.”

“No, I know why Aunt Genna came,” Fat Walda put her arms akimbo.

“You’re lying!”

“May I mayhaps be struck by thunder if I am!”

“Well, why did she?”

“She wants to marry you off, guess to whom?”

Fair Walda’s heart fluttered.

“I’m not going to guess.”

“And you’re right, ‘cause you never will. It is… it is…”

_Ser Edmure_ , Walda thought, _Dornish prince, king’s son._

“It’s Tyrion Lannister. A horrible disgusting dwarf. His eyes are mismatched, he runs on the roofs at night like a cat and he’s that tall,” Fat Walda slapped her wide hip. “Oh, you’ll get the best husband of them all! We’ll dress him in motley, like your uncle Jinglebell – and you’ll wear motley too!”

Fair Walda seized her by the hair.

However, it was Tyta that Aunt Genna meant for Tyrion Lannister, and great-grandfather refused the honor which made Aunt Genna all huffed.

_I could’ve been the Lady of Westerlands_ , Fair Walda thought, and for the umpteenth time she wished grim death to everyone.


	2. Fat Walda

The first time Walda, daughter of Merreth Frey, saw all her family together, was at a dinner when she was sitting on Mother’s lap. Grandfather, Lady Bethany and her children, Ser Stevron and his children and grandchildren sat at the high table, and farther below stretched long tables at which Walda’s kith and kin sat.

“Mummy, why are we so far?” she asked.

“Because at the lord’s table everyone takes his place by seniority, and your father is only a ninth son. But look, many people sit below us!”

But Walda wasn’t easily placated.

“Mummy, but why Perwyn and Benfrey sit higher than us? Perwyn is only a fifteenth son, and Benfrey’s even younger!”

Other children are taught how to count with sticks and apples, Walda had learned her numbers on grandfather’s sons. Number two seemed to her bald, like Uncle Emmon, number four was pockmarked like Uncle Jared, and number seven was sly like Uncle Symond.

“Because Perwyn and Benfrey are Lady Bethany’s sons, and every mother takes care of her children like I take care of you.”

“And of me!” Amerei interrupted.

“And of you too, of course. Sit straight and don’t fret.”

Walda scrutinized the dining hall. There were a lot of mothers in the Twins, and they all took care of their children and wished to push Walda lower, and some of them looked bigger and scarier than her own mother.

A dish of meat pasties was put in front of Grandfather Walder. Lady Bethany gave Perwyn and Benfrey a pasty each, offered the third to Willamen on her lap, and gestured for the dish to be passed farther. The pasties moved towards uncle Stevron. Walda watched spellbound as their number diminished. Grandfather loudly ordered to pass the pasties to Raymund, Father frowned – while he and Raymund were sons by the same mother, Raymund was younger. The servants took the dish and carried it along the table, and while they were passing Mother and Father, Walda turned, snatched a pasty and put it in her mouth, for safety.

“Hey, look at the little thief!” Raymund exclaimed.

“She’s a child,” Mother answered. “Would you grudge a pasty to a little girl? You eat, my darling.”

The pastry was wonderful, crusty, the minced pork meat inside of it was juicy and full of fat. Walda licked her lips, her stomach felt warm and she was content.

From that day she realized how much pleasure you could get from food. At first she used to gorge herself at dinner table – the sight of kith and kin seemed to whet her appetite. She would pick chicken wings clean, gather every drop of sauce with a bread crust, take two helpings of pease pudding, and when Amerei would give a pitiful look to her piece of pie and say, “Oh, but I’m full”, Walda would taste the sweet berries. No one at the Twins lacked food, but Walda felt that every mouthful she ate was taken from someone else’s plate, and it made food twice as sweet.

Pleasant satiety would make her smile in content. Freys rarely smiled unless they were planning some mischief, and a round-faced cheerful girl seemed to be a ray of sunshine in the dark passages. People would pat her head, pinch her round cheek and give her apples and gingerbread.

She was growing fast and soon grew taller than her elder sister.

“That because you pick at you food, Ami,” Mother reproached. “You wait, Walda is going to find a husband before you do, and she three years younger!”

After that Walda ate even when there were no people around. She stole cheese and sausages from the pantry, begged for liver pasties at the kitchen and hid raisins and almonds under her pillow. Every berry, every cake, every spoon of golden honey made her taller, stronger, bigger, and her smile grew wider.

By the time Grandfather began calling her “glutton”, Father – “sow in the pigsty”, and everyone in the castle – Fat Walda, nothing could dampen her sunny disposition. Walda would listen to the abuse, smile and heap some cabbage to her plate of roasted pork.

From time to time she was ordered to put on her best dress and to go with other maidens to the great hall where some lord, stuttering with embarrassment, would choose himself a wife while Grandfather glared. The lords usually shied away from Tyta and Fat Walda, gave Fair Walda stunned looks and generally felt like cocks-of-the-walk locked with a family of ferrets.

Grandfather promised that one day a king would come to this choosing, but Robb Stark, King in the North, married some beggarly slut. Fair Walda sobbed with hate. Fat Walda ate a head of cheese.

The very next bride-choosing went awry too. The lord, an elderly man with a soft voice, scrutinized the maidens, gave Fat Walda a long look (she noticed that his eyes were the color of riverside water) and said,

“This one.”

Grandfather’s face contorted with anger, but he motioned Fat Walda, and she obeyed.

“What’s your name, Walda, meet your future husband, Lord Bolton.”

Fat Walda grinned cheerfully. Grandfather gave her a disgusted look and ordered to bring the scale. Fat Walda understood what was going on only when Grandfather told her to stand on one scale, and the servants began putting ingots of silver on the other. Every ingot made her feel more significant, more expensive, more important. The scale she was standing on seemed to be stuck to the floor and Walda was smiling happily. At last the scale moved, she grabbed the chains and inhaled as much air as she could.

“Do you know why he chose you?” Fair Walda hissed when they were leaving the great hall. “Because you’re fat. You’re fatter than the fattest sow in the pigsty, and your Lord Bolton would marry a sow if they gave him its weight in silver.”

“Have you ever seen so much silver?” Fat Walda answered with a dreamy look. “A mountain of it! And all mine!”

Lord Bolton never called her neither “glutton”, nor “sow”, nor Fat Walda. He called her “milady”. That word was sweeter that honeycakes and appeased hunger better than beef with turnips and carrots. While the servants were washing blood from the Red Wedding in the great hall Fat Walda was standing in front of the mirror, eating a raisin bun and repeating,

“I’m his lady.”

She was in such an awe of her husband that before asking whether he was pleased with her she had eaten a dozen eggs fried with bacon and mushrooms, a round pie with apples and blackberries and a huge piece of cheese.

Lord Bolton pondered a bit (he never would say anything without thinking, and Fat Walda, big chatterbox, believed him very wise) and said,

“Yes, I am. You brought me a good dowry, you are obedient, and you are going to give me a child, I hope it’s a boy. I’m very pleased with you, milady.”

Now Fat Walda’s appetite doubled. Every hunk of bread, every baked fish, every piece of Lord Manderly’s meat pie made her feel that the child in her belly was growing bigger, healthier, stronger, that she was defending it, taking care of it. She looked into Ramsey Bolton pale eyes, saw the hate there and smiled back – good-naturedly and fearlessly.

_I’m not afraid of you_ , she thought. _I will eat you._


	3. Gatehouse Ami

“Ami, what were you doing with three men at once?”

Amerei sniffled. That night Father had blackened her eye and whipped her so hard she could only lie of her stomach. She didn’t care to answer stupid questions of her stupid little sister.

“What do you care? As if you knew what to do with _one_ man!”

Fat Walda wasn’t easily embarrassed or subdued.

“Of course, I know! A man and a woman, when they are together, make children – or bastards, if they are not married. Ami, are you going to have a bastard?”

Amerei jumped up and fell back on the bed with an indignant yelp.

“Never! I hate babies!”

It was true. From her earliest childhood Amerei knew that more heirs meant less inheritance, and she regarded every new baby at the Twins as a personal affront, especially if the baby was produced by her own parents.

“Then why did you?..”

“I wanted to have fun!”

And Amerei wept into her pillow.

Her black eye was still yellow-green when Pate of the Blue Fork knocked at the Twins’ gate. He had recently lost his horse and his arms at the tourney at King’s Landing and now was going from castle to castle trying to become a sworn shield. He had no idea about good fortune awaiting him at the Twins. Lord Frey didn’t take him as a sworn shield, of course, but he offered him a granddaughter instead, slightly soiled, but young and pretty, and a small dowry.

Amerei was terrified. Hedge knights went from castle to castle, they slept in the fields, they were put below the salt, and they were horribly, shamefully poor. She begged for mercy.

“I don’t give a shit about you being a whore,” Grandfather said calmly, “but you’re a fool into the bargain. You had one valuable thing, the one between the legs, and you gave in for free to some stable-boys. What should I do with you now except give to a hedge knight? Or maybe you hope to eat my bread till I die? No way.”

So Pate of the Blue Fork got Amerei, together with a piebald mare, a second-hand armor, a case of linen and a small bag of silver. With this money he bought a shack in Wendish Town and brought there his young wife.

Amerei took Grandfather’s words to heart and decided never to uncross her legs for free. Not even for her own husband. Pate quickly found out that if his young wife didn’t get some present in the daytime, at night she would turn her face to the wall and immediately fall asleep. He barely noticed as the rest of his silver went to procure a one-eyed servant, a red dress and sweet almonds Amerei loved. As luck would have it, Lord Blackwood decided to have a tourney at his castle, or Pate from the Blue Fork would’ve gotten frostbite on his cold marriage bed.

He was unhorsed at the first joust. The piebald mare and the second-hand armor became the property of Ser Marq Piper. Pate prepared himself for the years of abstinence, but, to his surprise, after Amerei had cursed her luckless destiny, she told him to sit and wait and in an hour came back with the horse and the armor.

“Ser Marq is a true knight, he’d always help a lady in distress,” she imparted with a sweet smile.

To tell the truth, Pate of the Blue Fork was rather slow, but not that slow.

“You are so foul!” he said bitterly.

Amerei was hurt. She believed she had made a clever deal, enough to make Grandfather proud of her. To spite her annoying husband she spent the evening dancing with the generous Ser Marq, and at night she thanked him thrice more.

When the next tourney came Pate left without her. Amerei had a good cry, washed her face in cold water and went to town for some fun. The first amiable young man she met chopped her wood and mended her lopsided porch. In the next few days Amerei replenished her stock of flour and lard, acquired three pair of stockings and arranged with the smith that he’d shoe the piebald mare for free.

Pate came back horseless, armorless, accompanied by someone called Ser Hunt, and, looking at his feet, said that his wife was going to pay the ransom. Ser Hunt, a hedge knight, had none of Ser Marq’s nobility and generosity. Amerei had to pay for two weeks straight, day and night, her stock in the pantry sadly diminished, and the smith shoed Ser Hunt’s horse as well – for free, of course.

At the next tourney at Seaguard Amerei made an acquaintance with the sweet elderly knight who made the lists, and this time Pate was put against the adversary even he was able to unhorse. At the feast Amerei winked to Ser Patrek Mallister and the Seaguard tourney turned into a perfect holiday.

They spent another week at the castle until Lord Mallister called Pate aside, gave him a small bag of silver and told him to get lost. On the way home Amerei kept looking back and humming a tune. A chain of gold was jumping up and down on her breast, the same chain that had adorned Ser Patrek neck last week.

Several merry years went by. Summer was at its height, the Riverlands were in full bloom, one tourney followed the other, and at each of them Amerei would meet some noble knight and have some profitable fun. She has been to Lannisport, to Strom’s End and was turning her hopeful eyes toward the Reach.

At the tourney in honor of prince Joffrey’s Twelfth Name Day Pate’s adversary was Ser Gregor Glegane. Amerei who had twice assured that her husband would be put against the weakest knight in the whole tourney opened her mouth to protest, but her shrill voice was drowned by the clatter of hooves. Pate fell from his saddle and never rose again.

“Well, who could’ve known?” Ser Arong Santagar said when tear-stained Amerei came to tell him her mind after the tourney. “I guess Ser Gregor hoped you’d ransom the horse and the armor from him.”

For the first time in her life Amerei felt her practicality wasn’t limitless. The piebald mare and the dented armor remained Ser Gregor’s property. Ser Patrek Mallister took the inconsolable widow to Wendish Town and promised to visit her now and then. Amerei dried her tears and began her profitable widowhood. She had such good luck that after a while a fat red-headed woman in a green dress came to her and offered Amerei a job in her brothel. Amerei remembered she was a lord’s granddaughter and a knight’s widow and gave a haughty refusal. The same night her house burned to the ground.

She came back to the Twins, was awfully bored for some time and resumed her nightly visits to the stables. Grandfather called her a fool, everyone else nicknamed her Gatehouse Ami, but at least she had fun.

At the Red Wedding she had her chance to prove her wits. Right after the bedding she dragged Ser Patrek to her room and hid his sword. Naked and armless, Patrek Mallister couldn’t put much of resistance, so he wasn’t killed like the others, just tied up and put to the cellar. Amerei, immensely proud of herself, brought him a bowl of gruel and a piece of a fish pie.

“You see how much I love you? I will make you the best wife in the world, but first you must convince your father to surrender Seagard to us.”

But Ser Partek called her an ugly name and spat into the gruel.


	4. Roslin Fisherwoman

From her earliest childhood Roslin knew Father loved her. Every time he saw her he would say, “Hey, you, what’s your name, Roslin, come here”, take her by the chin and turn her face to the light. Sometimes he would tell her to sing, listen to her and nod. To everyone around him Lord Frey would say that Roslin was a beauty, that she’d inherited her mother’s looks and was bound to get a good husband. Lady Annara, his wife, would smile sourly, and Roslin would be embarrassed – it seemed to her she stole something from her siblings, especially from Lady Annara’s children.

She had twenty two brothers and six sisters, but she loved Perwyn, Benfrey, Willamen and Olyvar best – they also were the children of Lady Bethany Rosby. Her brothers also would call her a beauty and ask her to sing, but their words never made Roslin embarrassed. Sometimes she dreamt about an evil stepmother who would turn her brother into white swans, and she, Roslin, would save them, like in a fairy-tale.

Willamen was sent to the Citadel to become a maester, every moon he wrote Roslin a letter bragging how he knew all sciences in the world now. Benfrey got married. And then Perwyn and Olywar went away with Robb Stark’s army, and Roslin was all alone in the castle with a hundred of brothers, sisters, nephews, nieces and second cousins twice removed.

“Hey you, what’s your name, Roslin, do you want to be a queen?” Father asked her from time to time.

She blushed, lowered her eyelashes and whispered,

“Whatever you say, Father.”

“Of course you do. Well, mayhaps Robb Stark will choose you, beauty that you are – you take it from your mother, you know.”

Robb Stark didn’t choose Roslin, though. He didn’t even choose Fair Walda. Robb Stark married some beggarly slut from Westerlands.

“What’s your name, Roslin, do you want to revenge Starks for insulting your family?” Father asked. He was lying in bed, fat leeches wriggling on his temples and his hairless chest – someone had told him that leeches sucked bad blood.

“Whatever you say, Father.”

“Good girl. I agreed to wed you to Edmure Tully.”

“Thank you, Father.”

“Listen to me first and thank me later. The wedding will be here, at the Twins. Northerners, riverlords, they all will come here, to see Lord Tully bed you. I will give them a fine feast, yeah, the Seven Kingdoms will never forget the wedding at the Twins!”

One of the leeches fell from his temple and plopped down on the blanket.

“You are bleeding, Father,” Roslin said fearfully.

“Me? No, girl, Robb Stark and his slut of a wife, that’s who’ll bleed. I’ll give such fine presents to them all: a knife across the throat, an arrow in the side, fetters and chains for the lucky. Go, tell that I ordered a new dress made for you. I want that pup Edmure Tully to look only at you at the wedding, I want him blind, deaf and mute, I want him to come to his senses only in the morning, when his kith and kin are dead. You’re a beauty, like your mother was. Go, call me a maester, I want him to take those creatures off.”

 

Edmure Tully wasn’t talking to her. Her was cursing and insulting other Freys, though, hoping they’d give him a sword or kill him. After he had nearly choked Black Walder with his chains everyone tried not to approach him, but they believed he wouldn’t hurt Roslin. She would bring him food and water, wash his bedding, clean his chamber-pot, and in a moon and a half he didn’t address her a single word.

Benfrey was killed at the wedding. Olywar didn’t come back to the Twins, he stopped answering Roslin’s letters. At first Perwyn didn’t want to talk to her as well, but then he relented. Every day she would take two bowls of gruel at the kitchens – for her lord husband and for herself, go to the cellar, come into the cell were her lord husband was chained to the wall, wish him good morrow, receive no answer, put the bowl in front of him, sit and eat. People at the Twins were calling her Roslin the Fisherwoman, on account of her catching the big trout.

In a moon and a half Father called her to his chambers.

“Maester says you’re pregnant.”

“Yes, Father.”

“And that fool Lady Catelyn was worried you have trouble conceiving!”

He gave her an appraising look and Roslin lowered her eyelashes fearfully.

“All right, you may carry this babe to term, let your next husband know you’re not barren.”

_My next husband?_ Roslin thought. _And what are you going to do with this one?_

All she said was,

“Thank you, Father. Mayhaps… mayhaps you’ll let me and Lord Edmure live together, like husband and wife? I’d like to have my lord husband close.”

Father chewed his lips suspiciously.

“Well, why not, after all? It’s not as if he can put a second child in you, while the first is inside. But I’m not taking his chains off, those Tullys are slippery fishes. He had just one night with you, and he managed to get you with his spawn! Go and pray it’s a girl.”

_And what if it is a boy?_ Roslin thought. _What will you do to the boy?_

“Whatever you wish, Father,” she said.

Roslin had never noticed that her bedroom’s window was barred, and the heavy oaken door was bound with metal and could be bolted from outside. Probably one of Lord Frey’s ancestors had had an unfaithful wife or a rebellious son locked there. Now Edmure Tully, his arms and legs in fetters, was bought there, and a guard stood behind the door.

“I’m with child, milord,” Roslin said timorously. “Your child.”

She thought in terror about what would happen if he were to say nothing even now.

Edmure Tully sat on the bed and put his hands between his knees. His chains clanked loudly.

“You cried at the wedding,” he said, and once again, as at that terrible day, Roslin thought that he had a beautiful voice.

“Yes, milord. And you kissed me and told me not to be scared. I’m so sorry, milord.”

“They… forced you to do it, didn’t they?”

Roslin knelt in front of him.

“Of course, milord. Please believe me, I never wanted to do you harm, I would’ve been a good wife to you…”

“You are already, better than I deserve. Rise, Lady Tully shouldn’t kneel in front of anyone.”

“Whatever you say, my lord husband.”

“Kiss me.”

Roslin hugged him, pressed her cheek to his soft beard and thought that in the whole castle full of her siblings, nephews, nieces and second cousins twice removed there was no one she loved half so much as she did her lord husband.

“Don’t cry,” Edmure said gently, “there’s no need for tears.”

“Whatever you say, husband.”


End file.
